Guest post by Bob Tisdale
Near the current end of the thread titled National Post: Thirty years of warmer temperatures go poof Allan asked, “What is your global average temperature prediction for the next several decades?” There were a few responses, including Allan’s. I sent an email to Anthony, letting him know I believed it would make a fun thread. He agreed and asked me to write up a starter post to get the ball rolling.
So, here’s Allan’s original group of questions:
What is your global average temperature prediction for the next several decades?
– warming or cooling?
– for how many years?
– on what technical basis?
– for the dataset provided (UAH Global anomaly) how would you extrapolate, if at all – linear, polynomial, or ???
– does anyone believe that a linear extrapolation is valid? If yes, how do you reconcile with the cyclical nature of the PDO and global avg. temperatures?
Let’s hear what you believe, not just what you don’t believe.
Thanks, Allan
I didn’t want to repost the comments of the others without their okay. If they wish, they can add them and identify themselves, or you can go back to the thread and see who they were. Here’s my response, edited with the correction already included:
Allan: I’ll join in the predictions, but I’ll use the slow cycle in the Southern Ocean SST anomalies as my base.
Cooling for 50 to 60 years, counteracting most if not all of the warming over the last 60 years. There will be amplification then dampening of the cooling due to Thermohaline Circulation/Meridional Overturning Circulation in the North Atlantic and North Pacific. They’ll run in synch at first, but then the cycles will counteract one another. The intermittent positive step changes resulting from large El Nino events (82/83 and 97/98 magnitude) will disappear, since the additional heat supplied to the equatorial Pacific by the Southern Ocean and the THC/MOC in the North Pacific has been dissipated. They’ll be replaced by larger and more frequent La Ninas.
We’ll check back here on this thread in 20 years, see how we’re doing.
My prognostication is based on too many hours spent looking at graphs of sea surface temperature, many of which I post at my blog: http://bobtisdale.blogspot.com/
So, as Allan said, “Let’s hear what you believe, not just what you don’t believe.” There are no right or wrong answers. Twenty to fifty years from now some of you will be able to claim you predicted what happened.
I predict cooling for 25-30 years, ala the PDO/ENSO cycle. But I also predict that either the CO2-AGW true-believers will not admit that CO2 is not causing warming, even when the glaciers are at the Chicago city limits–or they will blame the cooling on CO2.
@ur momisugly Simon Abingdon
Oh yes, I read that open letter from Viscount Monckton of Brenchley at American Thinker.
I sent it along to others.
It was so brilliant and so touching in its unabashed love and concern for America.
http://www.americanthinker.com/2008/10/an_open_letter_from_the_viscou_1.html
Well, on the decadal scale climate is largely determined by the various external forcings, and assuming the net forcings continue to be dominated by GHGs, an extremely safe assumption indeed, and given the committed climate change already in the pipeline it is hard to see anything other than an increasing warming trend. In terms of hard numbers, I expect the next El Nino to occur sometime before 2011 and that it will drive the global average temperature for the year in which it occurs to the highest level in recent centuries, probably for millenia. Looking forward, I have confidence in the IPCC mean projection of +0.2C / decade for the next few decades, driven by GHG forcing with shorter lulls and periods of faster warming caused by unforced variability, ENSO, volcanoes etc – this being the pattern we have seen for the last few decades. The trend beyond that largely depends on global economic growth, which is a lot harder to predict,and the extent to which we manage to decouple this from our carbon emissions. JP. .
I predict that in 20 years time, the climate will be be different in some way from today…
REPLY: I think we have a winner! That is about as much as anyone can accurately say. – Anthony
Ooops! Now with hyperlinks …
Well, on the decadal scale climate is largely determined by the various external forcings, and assuming the net forcings continue to be dominated by GHGs, an extremely safe assumption indeed, and given the committed climate change already in the pipeline it is hard to see anything other than an increasing warming trend. In terms of hard numbers, I expect the next El Nino to occur sometime before 2011 and that it will drive the global average temperature for the year in which it occurs to the highest level in recent centuries, probably for millenia. Looking forward, I have confidence in the IPCC mean projection of +0.2C / decade for the next few decades, driven by GHG forcing with shorter lulls and periods of faster warming caused by unforced variability, ENSO, volcanoes etc – this being the pattern we have seen for the last few decades. The trend beyond that largely depends on global economic growth, which is a lot harder to predict,and the extent to which we manage to decouple this from our carbon emissions.
JP.
Bob and Anthony,
I don’t think you should be encouraging this.
Keith (3rd comment) is right. And it’s good to see so many joke and spoof responses.
The viewpoint of the intelligent skeptic is that the future climate cannot be predicted.
Most proper scientists are well aware of this, but unfortunately the IPCC and most ‘climate scientists’ still haven’t got it. The irony is that it was a climate scientist (well, meteorologist) Ed Lorenz who first showed this.
I can choose the stick?
Certainly, I want the J.
But: If someone read http://www.surfacestations.org
And ask. How is it possible? with these stations to obtain measures of 0,001 K?
The answer: it is simply statistical magic.
If you remove the magic of the statistical result will be a long-term plan.
The satellite measures are more real. (Apparently). Only as of 1979.
If I understood something. The temperature of the Earth is (290 +/- 10) K. and humanity survived (+ / – 5,000,000 years)
In the context: I agree with Allan said, “Let’s hear what you believe, not just what you do not believe.”
“Weather-climate signals have become significant, and the global circulation has evolved to exhibiting a strong La-Nina behavior.” Ed Berry, NWS SOO (commenting on his – unofficial – website).
http://weatherclimatelink.blogspot.com/
Cold-phase PDO + re-strengthening La Nina support a cold northern hemisphere winter 2008 – 2009.
Effects of very low solar activity are unproven and remain to be seen.
Unusually cold weather WILL, certainly, be widely blamed on the sun, but a causal link will remain nearly impossible to prove.
Neither is there is any generally-accepted method of forecasting longer-term weather. Official predictions beyond about 7 days are given in terms of “above average,” “below average,” or “equal chances.”
I expect a colder than normal winter this year, and being based on specific atmospheric and ocean patterns, one which will have certain specific features, especially those associated with negative, cold-phase AO & NAO (Arctic Oscillation & North Atlantic Oscillation). Some graphics here
http://www.intellicast.com/Community/Content.aspx?a=127
(note especially – FRIGID over the eastern US, the UK and northern Europe).
Solar variations may drive climate variations. There is still no dependable method of predicting solar variations, so it follows that there would be no dependable method of predicting solar-driven climate variations.
After spending many years in their warm phases, decadal to multi-decadal patterns have switched to their cold phases, and may remain there for many years. This is by no means assured.
I think its good for all of us if – modest – cooling continues for several years. That would encourage development of energy generation that actually achieves a goal, for example, actually keeping us warm at a reasonable price, instead of just giving us a warm ‘green’ feeling at an outrageous price…
…and, if we’re very lucky, will encourage the development of food production and distribution which is resilient in conditions of adverse climate.
Otherwise, I fear we may end up going “Green” in a very big way, a very soylent way.
Paul Shanahan (14:27:05) :
I predict that in 20 years time, the climate will be be different in some way from today…
REPLY: I think we have a winner! That is about as much as anyone can accurately say. – Anthony
Unless it’s the same as today’s. How can you decide a winner? I cry foul, I say.
A thread after my own heart. Folly or not, prediction is what actuaries do. Why should letting a little thing like unpredictability in temperatures stand in the way of making a projection?
My methodology is based on actuarial papers, in looking at temperature as a series of values driven by constantly shifting parameters. Correlation is assumed to be driven by 132 months of historical measures.
There are 6 weighting schemes derived as follows:
(1) rolling 60, 120, 180, 240, 300, and 360 month slopes are calculated
(2) The incremental first differences of these rolling slopes are determined
(3) the incremental second differences of these rolling slopes are determined
(4) using solver, optimal weights are determined to apply against the preceding 132 second differences in order to predict the next subsequent second difference, which can then be used to determine the predicted anomaly. The optimum weights are determined by the sum of least squares of the projected anomalies versus actual.
(5) In addition, a straight weighting of actual anomalies is calculated to project the next anomaly, using optimal weights.
(6) Finally, the seven projected anomalies are optimally weighted to determine how much weight to give to each individual method, again determined via least squares.
(7) After all the sets of weights are determined, projected values can be determined. Under the theory that the estimate for the next period is the best estimate, that estimate can then be used to project subsequent anomalies. This can continue for as long as desired. Obviously, the further out one projects, the less accurate it is likely to be. But short-term results have actually been fairly good, in my opinion.
The results of that method are shown here:
http://digitaldiatribes.wordpress.com/2008/10/21/october-2008-update-on-global-temperature-ncdc/
I list the projected anomalies through 2009 by month, and provide a chart through January 2018.
If I extend this to 2030, I get anomalies around -2 degrees Celsius. But the projections do seem to start breaking down at some point, so I don’t trust the long-term. But I’ll keep tweaking to see if I can figure out improvements that help make out long-term improvements.
Joe Tritz
The Idiot
It uses NCDC anomalies, for no particular reason.
PaulM: My answer is “pfft.” (respectfully, of course…)
There’s no harm in a fun little game of prediction. As long as you’re not claiming that you know with such confidence what is going to happen that you start proposing governmental policy changes or whatever, I personally get a kick out of seeing how close I can get with such things.
Who cares if I’m wrong? Certainly not me.
Sometimes it’s good to not take yourself too seriously and wring your hands about the negative potential of a seemingly futile exercise. Just put a model together and have some fun, dagnabbit! Life’s too short.
I really apologize for the three posts in a row, but I also just wanted to apologize for the bandwidth hog of my charts on the link I provided. I am hopefully going to get time to work on that and speed things up tonight.
JP; I will take that bet. How much you want to wager?
Id say current cooling PDO with predominance of cooling La Ninas over next 20 -30 years – probably drop of 0.5-1 d celcius. Loss of heat/increase of cloud cover due to sun inactivity with solar minimum 2009 and 2 low cycles after – probable drop of temps 0.5 -1 d c. If we get significant volcanism which is more likely during cooling cycles add another 0.5 -1 d c drop. All up drop of 1.5 – 3d c possible on average, however some areas will cool more than others as typical with ENSO trends.
PaulM (14:33:02) :
Bob and Anthony,
” I don’t think you should be encouraging this.
Keith (3rd comment) is right. And it’s good to see so many joke and spoof responses.
The viewpoint of the intelligent skeptic is that the future climate cannot be predicted.”
Is that another “consensus?”
Rhetorical question. Obviously, it is not another “consensus.” You speak for yourself alone.
You have not been appointed the spokesperson for “the intelligent skeptic,” nor is your opinion anything but your opinion, whether you invoke “the intelligent skeptic,” “the scientific community,” or even, “all us smart people.”
“Most proper scientists are well aware of this,”
omg.
AND you determine which scientists are “proper?” Are you by any chance that guy who’s been appointed (anointed?) the next president?
” but unfortunately the IPCC and most ‘climate scientists’ still haven’t got it. The irony is that it was a climate scientist (well, meteorologist) Ed Lorenz who first showed this.”
The late Edward Norton Lorenz neither “showed” or claimed to “show” any such thing.
Work on becoming a better spokesperson for your own opinion before you presume to speak for others.
My predictions:
Cooling until 2030, based on the PDO switching to its la Nina mode and the Sun dimming after high activities in the past 5 decades. Extrapolation based on a sinus curve with about 60 year periods time-synced with the PDO and amplitude-synced with UAH with volcanoes cooling removed. Temperatures and precipitations in the 2030’s will be similar to temperature in the 1970s.
Climate is all cycles so linear extrapolations are useless at best, misleading at worse.
I created 36 spaghetti graph models. When I threw them against the wall, every single one of them fell to the floor. I take this as robust proof that temperatures are falling.
I predict that in 20 years
I will be enjoying my retirement
The sun will rise in the east and set in the west later that day
There will be a flood somewhere in the world (maybe more than one)
There will be a drought or two somewhere else in the world
There will be a tropical storm brewing up somewhere in the world
A glacier somewhere will shed some ice and another glacier somewher else will gain some ice
There will ice at both the Arctic and Antarctic
We will still be complaining about MSM bias on some issue or other
The internet will need a new means of management due to the amount of traffic on it
Al Gores seaside mansion in California will still be above water
I will be enjoying a glass of red wine produced from my small vineyard as I watch the sun set.
Cooling should continue for a minimum of 5 years. If the sun becomes more active tomorrow, it will take at least 5 years for the oceans to warm. Hopefully, the cooling continues long enough to extinguish this CO2 nonsense. A green earth requires CO2. 1200 parts per million would be a great start.
Speaking of 20 years… In 1988 Bill Moyers aired a series of interviews on PBS with the late philosopher Joseph Campbell, whose famous saying was “Follow Your Bliss.”
There is a brewing company in Ft. Collins, Colorado, The New Belgian Brewing Co., maker of Fat Tire beer and other brands, whose corporate saying is “Follow Your Folly.”
Reading these blogs, following along, is blissful and definitely not folly.
This blog and all the comments are great reading. They stimulate my thinking and fantasizing — a non-scientist who has had more than enough of Discovery Channel and its ilk. I can’t do the math that everyone else on this blog adores, but I can read fun articles. I wonder where the next few decades fit into long-term climate change, e.g., the earth transversing an “arm” of the milky way (lots of cosmic rays, therefore, more cloud cover and more cooling); or modern milankovich cycles of 26,000, 21,000, 41,000 years meeting at certain critical points — perhaps one might occur in the next few decades. If I am reading correctly, I think we are moving away from the sun on the eliptical orbit. Would this have anything to do with cooling in the near future, even though the oceans seem to tell the tale. I read one prediction by “Hank” that I thoroughly enjoyed.
“The polar temperatures have been falling already for a few thousands of years, depending how we decide to measure it….Probably the trend will continue. Anytime between this year (2008) and several thousand years from now, we should expect temperatures to plummet….”
I think I read on this blog: “A warm planet is a happy planet”. I’m ready to welcome all the help that CO2 of the modern industrial world can give us for a comfy environment. I thank Anthony and everyone else for one of the most enjoyable places on the internet.
It will be partly to mostly cloudy with a 50% chance of decreasing temperature. Overnight lows will be lower and afternoon highs will be higher than the overnight lows. Chance of precipitation is about 40%. Now let’s look at our extended forcast, we’ve got some real nice climate in store for the upcoming half of the century followed by climate change as we head into the later decades. Details at 11:00
Don B,
Fat Tire beer is great, but I hate how their brewery (soccer) team always beats my team.
Looks like UAH October LT temperatures are going to be well below last year.
http://discover.itsc.uah.edu/amsutemps/execute.csh?amsutemps
The UAH link didn’t work. This one should do better.
http://discover.itsc.uah.edu/amsutemps/amsutemps.html
Yep -the Viscount certainly continues to deliver value for money, and is adroit at keeping his media profile at a high level. but does nobody find it a little odd that that the most rational and lucid voice in the world today in opposition to the global warming alarmists has no scientific training and has never published a single academic journal article?
Let us look at the clearest and most penetrating debunking of global warming theory ever written with a properly sceptical eye, and examine only those claims for which Monckton cites support from the literature. Incidentally, he gives no reference list, as would be helpful, so errors may creep in.
Monckton:During each of the last four interglacial periods over the past half-million years, temperature was 5 to 8 °F warmer than the present (Petit et al., 1999).
(Petit et al., 1999). is this paper . It does indeed find warmer temperatures, in the Antarctic anyway ,in previous interglacials, but links these to higher CO2 levels, as they conclude … Atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide and methane correlate well with Antarctic air-temperature throughout the record. Present-day atmospheric burdens of these two important greenhouse gases seem to have been unprecedented during the past 420,000 years.
Take aim at foot…FIRE!
Monckton At both Poles, it was warmer only half a century ago than it is today. For temperatures in the Arctic, see Soon et al. (2004). For the Antarctic, see Doran et al. (2002).
Soon is of course, Willie Soon but I am unable to find anything he published in 2004 on Arctic temperatures. Maybe the reference is to this press release. but it hardly qualifies as published science. For the NOAA view of the Arctic see here …
Doran et al did indeed find net Antarctic cooling, but was swiftly rebutted by Turner et al. who found ‘an inappropriate extrapolation of station data across large, data-sparse areas of the Antarctic.’
Monkton: During the Grand Maximum, the Sun was more active, and for longer, than during almost any previous similar period in the past 11,400 years (Solanki et al., 2005; and see Usoskin et al., 2003; and Hathaway, 2004)
No doubt. But here are Sami Solanki’s thoughts…I am not a denier of global warming produced by an increase in the concentration of greenhouse gases. Already at present the overwhelming source of global warming is due to manmade greenhouse gases and their influence will continue to grow in the future as their concentration increases Ooops!
Monckton: A symposium of the International Astronomical Union [2004] concluded that it is the Sun that was chiefly responsible for the warming of the late 20th century.
I think this is a reference to the conclusions of a single author Habibullo I. Abdussamatov, who believes we should Look to Mars for the truth on global warming
Monckton: From 1700-1998, temperature rose at a near-uniform rate of about 1 °F per century [Akasofu, 2008].
This is Syun-Ichi Akasofu. The reference cannot be to a peer reviewed paper on climate science because Akasofu has not written any. The actual rate is anything but uniform.
Monckton: A recent survey (Schulte, 2008) of 539 peer-reviewed scientific papers published since January 2004 and selected at random using the search term “global climate change” reveals that not a single paper provides any evidence whatsoever that “time is short” or that “the dangers are great”.
Schulte is a consultant endrochrinologist. Schulte 2008 appeared in Energy and Environment. available in a total of 26 libraries worldwide.
Monckton: Professor Bhat reports that most of the glaciers have been receding at a uniform rate since 1880 at the latest. Some of them had begun receding even before this date. His analysis is confirmed on a global scale by Robinson, Robinson & Soon (2007), who report that since 1880 mountain glaciers have receded worldwide at a near-uniform rate, with no appreciable acceleration in the second half of the 20th century,
Robinson & Robinson are (presumably) Arthur and Zachary Robinson, father and son team who run the OISM. I did not bother searching for the ‘paper’ as neither has any qualifications in climate science. Indeed Monckton appears to be relying for climate science on a guy who issued a bogus scientific paper and his son, whose degree is in vetinary science.
And that, apart from a large amount of unsupported hand-waving, is that. Were I an AGW sceptic I would feel profoundly depressed that the Viscount is apparently as good as it gets.